


Birthday Gifts

by rebel_wren



Category: Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Birthday, Birthday Presents, Fluff, Gen, Grandpa Cham Syndulla, Parental Hera Syndulla, Passing Down Gifts, Post-Finale, Sabine Kanan and Ezra are all mentioned but not in the story, Uncle Rex, Uncle Zeb
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-20
Updated: 2019-01-20
Packaged: 2019-10-13 10:43:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17486654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rebel_wren/pseuds/rebel_wren
Summary: After the war is over and Sabine has gone to search for Ezra, it's Jacen's birthday, so Hera invites a couple of guests over, who bring him presents to open.





	Birthday Gifts

Hera lifted her son, spinning him around as he giggled. She brought him in for a close, tight hug, kissing him on the cheek, which made him laugh even more.

“Happy birthday, Jacen!”

Jacen just laughed some more, and Hera looked at him, her eyebrows raised in amusement.

“You okay, sweetheart? You got a case of the giggles?”

Jacen nodded, still laughing, and Hera smiled and kissed his cheek again.

“I love you so much, Jacen.”

“Love you too, Mama!” Jacen exclaimed through laughter.

Hera sat down, with him sitting in her lap. She smoothed his hair and bounced him slightly with her knees.

“Grampa is coming to see you today, and he said he brought you a present.”

Jacen’s eyes lit up, and Hera could see Kanan in them.

“Really?”

Hera nodded, her smile wide. “Yes! Uncle Zeb and I got you presents too, and Uncle Rex said he’s making you a cake.”

“What kinda cake?”

“I don’t know. I think it’s a surprise.”

Jacen nodded, and put a hand to his chin as if deep in thought about this surprise cake of Rex’s. Not that he’d learned much about different types of cakes in his couple of years in the galaxy.

There was a knock at the door, and Hera set Jacen down to go get the door. She opened it to find Zeb standing there, a box in his hand. She smiled, and as she took the box from him he pulled her into a tight hug,

“I’m so glad you could make it, Zeb,” Hera said in the hug. “I know it’s a long trip for you.”

“Please, I couldn’t miss Jacen’s birthday! What do you take me for?”

Hera simply laughed, and pulled away from Zeb, sitting the present on the table with hers, along with the one Sabine had given Hera before she’d left. Hera had honestly hoped Sabine would be back with Ezra in time before Jacen’s birthday that year, but she’d always known that could be too much of a time crunch.

“Uncle Zeb!” Jacen shouted, and Hera spun around to see Jacen running to Zeb. Zeb knelt down, and when Jacen practically collided with him, Zeb wrapped his arms around him.

“Good to see you, kiddo!”

“Pick me up, pick me up!”

Hera laughed and shook her head, and saw Chopper rolling down the hall towards Zeb and Jacen.

“I dont’t know, Jacen,” Zeb teased. “I think you’re getting a little too big for me.”

“You can still do it! Please?”

Zeb mimed thinking for a second, and then sighed. “Alright, I’ll try.”

Jacen lifted his arms in preparation, and Zeb put his hands on Jacen, and groaned in pretend-effort as he picked Jacen off the floor slowly, finally settling into him into his arms. Jacen giggled, while Hera watched with folded arms.

“What do we say to Uncle Zeb, Jacen?”

“Thank you!”

Chopper finally rolled up to Zeb, and Zeb shifted Jacen to one side, reached down and patted Chopper’s dome.

“Hey, Chop, long time no see. You aren’t giving Hera too much trouble, are you?”

Chopper warbled an “of course not,” and Hera smiled.

Having the family be as close to back together as possible would always be one of the most important things to her.

* * *

 

It wasn’t long before her father arrived, hugging and kissing both her and Jacen, putting a bagged gift on the table with the others and exchanging greetings with both Zeb and Chopper. Shortly after that, Rex finally arrived, bringing both a presetnt and what turned out to be a glaze cake, sparking about a million questions about glaze cakes from Jacen.

Soon, Hera scooped Jacen up.

“What do you want first, Jacen? Presents or cake?”

“Presents!”

Everyone laughed at his enthusiasm, and Hera nodded.

“Alright, alright, presents it is.”

She took all the presents off the table, and sat down cross-legged, with Zeb, Rex and her father sitting on the floor too, forming a sort of circle. Jacen crawled into her lap, and Hera wrapped her arms around him.

“Which one do you want to open first?”

Jacen pointed to Sabine’s gift. “That one.”

Hera met Zeb’s eyes as he stretched to pick it up, and handed the present to her.

“This is Sabine’s present. Before she left, she told me to give it you on your birthday.”

She wasn’t sure Jacen even heard her as he just tugged at the colorful wrapping paper, and tore it away to reveal a small cardboard box. Hera helped him open it, and Jacen examined it. Inside the box was a collection of patches that had obviously been made for him by Sabine. There were all different animals- convor, loth-wolves, loth-cats, mynocks- as well as some of Sabine’s starbirds. Hera picked up one of the patches, one of Chopper, and Chopper made a triumphant noise, sparking laughter from everyone. Jacen looked up at Hera, and she smiled at him.

“We can put these on your vest, if you want.”

Jacen nodded eagerly. “Okay!”

“And when Sabine gets back, we’ll thank her, right?”

“Yes!”

“Very good.” Hera patted his arm. “Okay, which one are we opening next?”

Zeb pushed his present towards them. “How about this one?”

Jacen grabbed the box and opened it, and pulled out a model of a 690 light freighter. He gasped, and looked it over. Hera frowned.

“Mama, what kind of ship is this?”

“It’s a Ghtroc 690,” Hera answered, and then glared at Zeb. “It’s an okay ship, but no VCX-100.”

Zeb laughed, and grinned at Jacen. “You like it?”

Jacen nodded, and stood up to go and hug the sitting Zeb.

“Thank you, Uncle Zeb.”

“You’re welcome, kiddo.”

Jacen turned around, and sat right in Zeb’s lap. Hera raised an eyebrow at him, but she had a playful smile on her face.

“You’re sitting with Uncle Zeb now?”

Jacen nodded, and everyone. Hera shook her head, still laughing. “Alright, then, I see how it is. Can you at least open my present next?”

She passes him her gift, which is a picture book about different famous pilots. She didn’t think he’d find it all that exciting, but he still gasped and told her how much she loved it, and ran over to give her a hug and a kiss, which she of course returned before he went back to sit with Zeb. The next present was Rex’s, which was a small toy blaster pistol. Hera smiled and was thanking Rex when Jacen shot Chopper with one of the foam darts.

It was the last present, her dad’s, that was in a bag. Jacen reached into the bag, past the layer of tissue paper, and pulled out a pale blue tooka doll. It looked a little faded, and there was a yellow stitch on one of the sides,

A stitch right where a young Twi’lek girl had once ripped it on the corner of a table, and cried until her parents fixed it for her.

Jacen squeezed the tooka in his hands, while Hera looked at her father. He didn’t meet her eyes, he only looked at Jacen who was gently playing with it.

“That was your mother’s when she was about your age. She lost it a long time ago, but I found it and kept it. I thought you’d like it.”

Jacen looked up from the tooka doll with a big smile. “Thank you grampa!”

Cham finally looked at Hera with a smile, and she just scooted over to him, hugging him while they sat on the floor

“Thank you,” she mumbled into his shoulder.

“You’re welcome.”

She broke away from the hug, and saw Zeb and Rex with soft expressions on their faces. Hera crawled over and sat in front of Zeb and Jacen.

“Can I see him?”

Jacen handed it over to her, and she turned the doll over in her hands. She felt her eyes water just a little bit. It’d been years since she’d seen it. She looked up at Jacen.

“I used to play with him all the time. I called him my  _ nerra _ .”

“Brother,” Jacen said slowly. She’d been working on teaching him both Basic and Twi’leki. Hera nodded proudly.

“Yes. I brought him everywhere with me.”

“Can I bring him everywhere too?”

Hera handed the doll back to him.

“Of course you can. He’s yours now.”

Jacen beamed at her as he hugged the tooka doll tightly.

* * *

 

The night would finish with dinner for everyone, and then they ate Rex’s cake. Zeb left first, having the longest trip home, with Rex not too long afterwards. Hera put Jacen to bed, putting all of his presents in his room. She smiled when she saw him asleep and curled up with her old tooka doll. Hera said goodbye to her father at the door with a hug, and then went to sleep herself.

She had good dreams that night. Her family may not have been completely whole anymore, but that didn’t mean there was no value in what she had left.


End file.
